Senate Democrats labeled billionaire Elon Musk “co-president” and “shadow speaker” among other titles as they reacted to the original stopgap spending deal’s implosion on Wednesday after he and ultimately President-elect Donald Trump came out against it.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., said Musk “seems to be the guy in charge of the country now,” reacting to his apparent ability to influence the bill’s prompt failure despite it having been agreed upon by bipartisan leaders in Congress.
If a measure to provide funding for the government is not passed by Congress and signed by President Joe Biden by midnight on Saturday morning, a partial government shutdown will go into effect.
As of Thursday, the U.S. national debt was at $36,167,604,149,955.61 and continues to climb rapidly.
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After a 1,547-page short-term spending bill was debuted this week. Musk quickly took to X, formerly Twitter, to trash it, pointing out various seemingly irrelevant provisions as well as its cost and length.
He was soon joined by other critics, and President-elect Donald Trump and Vice President-elect JD Vance issued their own statement opposing the bill.
This led to significant criticism from Democrats unhappy with Musk’s apparent ability to influence Trump and the Republicans in Congress.
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“He’s the one who seems to be calling the shots,” Warren told reporters.
“Elon Musk is the one evidently in charge of the Republican Party and has blown that deal up. So I don’t know how the Republicans are planning to recover from that,” she said.
Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa., suggested that Musk is “already the shadow speaker of the House,” in a slight against House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La.
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“I think he’s unelected, and he’s created a whole lot of damage,” said Sen. Raphael Warnock, D-Ga.
He claimed Republicans in Congress were “busy listening to Co-President Musk and co-President Trump.”
“I’m listening to the people of Georgia, especially the farmers who are struggling to get disaster relief. And, we need to make sure that we get that over the finish line.”
Sen. Mark Kelly, D-Ariz., reiterated that Musk is not an elected official. “He doesn’t have any official government job,” he said.
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“We had a deal with Republicans in the House and now, because of him, the president-elect is on the verge of people losing their jobs and not getting paid over the holidays,” he said of a potential partial shutdown if a bill is not passed by a deadline of midnight on Saturday morning.
Despite their Democrat colleagues’ claims, Republicans pushed back on the idea that Trump was being influenced by Musk. Sen. James Lankford, R-Okla., noted that there are “lots of people around President Trump,” adding that he doesn’t think Musk has control over what the president-elect does.
Musk was tapped by Trump, along with former presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, to lead what is called the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), a proposed advisory board tasked with eliminating government waste.
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